July 10, 2011

Scenarios for the Development of the Transnistria Conflict

(in English and Ukrainian)
This report was prepared by the Institute of World Policy (Ukraine) in partnership with the Polish-Ukrainian Cooperation Foundation – PAUCI (Poland), the Institute for Public Affairs (Slovakia), the Institute of Sociology under the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (Hungary), and the Association for International Affairs (Czech Republic).
The conflict in Transnistria has been frozen for nearly 20 years at this point, plenty of time for the stand-off to establish very deep roots. This offers both benefits and drawbacks to any resolution of the problem. On one hand, the conflicting sides no longer feel the extreme hostility that had to be overcome in the early 1990s. With the emotional tension declining, the ground is set for communicating and resolving both current issues between the two sides in the conflict and strategic issues that will resolve the problem altogether.

In preparing this report, the Institute of World Policy (IWP) has based its analysis on the assumption that the political conditions for settling the conflict in Transnistria need to be accompanied by initiatives from civil society. And this kind of comprehensive approach could provide additional leverage for stimulating political will and resolving the situation. In this context, the launch of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace “Non-government working group for a solution to the Transnistria conflict” in 2010, received considerable notice. The working group is aimed at uniting efforts of non-state representatives of all negotiating parties in order to come up with a solution to the Transnistria issue.
n the context of this project, analysts from the Institute of World Policy undertook working visits to Chisinau and Tiraspol. In writing this document, previous analytical reports on the Transnistria conflict by both Ukrainian and foreign specialists were considered. The issue was discussed with members of the diplomatic corps and expert circles in Ukraine, Moldova, Romania, Russia, Germany, the US, the OSCE, and the EU Delegations to Moldova and Ukraine.
The purpose of this study was to analyze all possible scenarios for the situation to develop around the Transnistria conflict and to describe possible risks and benefits related to each of the scenarios. The likelihood of each scenario over the next five years was also assessed and ranked on a 10-point scale based on the combined evaluations of 32 experts from Ukraine, Moldova, Russia, the EU countries and the US polled on the matter. The IWP working group also identified possible compromises that the sides might agree to in order to resolve the conflict.